The Insider: BioPassword to hackers -- crack this account

Published 10:00 pm, Sunday, October 22, 2006

Issaquah-based BioPassword -- whose software denies or grants access to computers based on the way people type -- is offering an open challenge to people next month to try to beat its security system.

The company plans to post the "BioPassword Challenge" on its Web site the week of Nov. 6, inviting people to try to crack five separate accounts. Participants will then be able to see how their score compares with others who are trying to break in.

Doug Wheeler, vice president of marketing at BioPassword, doesn't anticipate anyone getting very close. "I wouldn't do this if I actually thought someone was going to win," he said.

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It is not the first time that the company -- backed by Citrix, Ignition Partners and OVP Venture Partners -- has pulled the stunt. At a conference in Las Vegas last year, BioPassword offered $10,000 to anyone who could crack the code. Of the 1,200 people who tried, "no one even came close," bragged BioPassword Chairman Mark DiSalle.

Can you really identify a computer user by the way they type?

In an interview last year, DiSalle said the technology's roots can be traced to Morse code operators in World War II who figured out how to determine message senders based upon tapping patterns. In extensive military and intelligence studies, DiSalle said it was "proved that everyone has a unique typing rhythm."

BioPassword already has some converts. It has sold more than 400,000 software licenses to some 30 customers -- mainly financial institutions and health care organizations. Wheeler said the company is targeting about 1 million licenses this year.

WE'VE HEARD OF HIM: To say that Boeing Chief Executive Jim McNerney has maintained a low profile in Seattle since taking over the job would be a considerable understatement, but he'll be prominently on display in the coming weeks in at least one Seattle venue: newsstands where the Oct. 30 issue of Fortune magazine is on sale.

McNerney is the issue's cover boy, to illustrate the theme "what it takes to be great." The introduction to the Q&A inside notes that "it's tough to find an executive who has delivered top performance across as wide a swath of business." McNerney credits his experience at General Electric under the tutelage of Jack Welch, as well as his own parents. He also says he admires Steve Jobs for "his ability to commercialize innovation. That was the struggle at 3M (where McNerney worked before Boeing) -- there's lots of innovation at the company, but how is it commercialized sustainably? That guy is the best I've known at that."

One other much more locally visible executive Fortune interviewed to learn the secrets of greatness: Costco's Jim Sinegal. The headline: "Why Costco Is So Damn Addictive."

CARLY IN TOWN: Perhaps it's fate or maybe just incredible luck.

Either way, the recent scandal at Hewlett-Packard has been nothing short of a blessing to Carly Fiorina, who comes to Seattle today to speak and pitch her new book, "Tough Choices," which chronicles her rise and fall running HP.

Fiorina, who was fired in February 2005, has been featured in numerous national media shows and publications since the book was released earlier this month. She will address the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce at noon in the Grand Hyatt in downtown Seattle.

Some reports have questioned her book as revisionist history, but Fiorina clearly is a draw. A few hundred people are expected to hear her speech, and her book signings across the country have attracted long lines.

During her tenure at HP, Fiorina was hailed as one of the most powerful women in America, but it also included the layoffs of thousands of employees and she pushed through a controversial merger with rival Compaq. While the firing was publicly humiliating, she walked away with a $21 million severance.

WINE HANDICAP: Abu Jahmal, a former stockbroker and Seattle-based wine educator, wants to help those in the business world with the fine art of knowing the "language of wine."

Jahmal said corporate deals of today are just as likely to occur at a wine bar as a golf course. And, he added, that's especially true in soggy Seattle.

So he has organized a wine education series that's themed around 18 holes of golf. The first is 2-4 p.m. on Sunday at Hotel Vintage Park. Future events are Nov. 5, 12 and 19 at neighboring Tulio Ristorante, 1100 Fifth Ave. Each session includes food and wine.

"Learn to speak wine, and your next contract, promotion or hire is that much easier," Jahmal says. "Washington boasts a $3 billion wine industry. You are bound to find yourself in a situation in which knowledge of wine can help you, and ignorance could hurt."

The four-part series sessions are 90 minutes each and cost $65 per person per event.